ne of them is white. I don't suppose you'll have much
time to collect things, but I keep hoping that some day, if I live,
you'll command a ship of your own, and take me with you, as they do take
scientific men some voyages. I hope I shall live. I don't think I get
any worse. Cripples do sometimes live a long time. I asked Dr. Brown if
he believed any cripple had ever lived to be a hundred, and he said he
didn't know of one, nor yet ninety, nor eighty, for I asked him. But
he's sure cripples have lived to be seventy. If I do, I've got
fifty-four years yet. That sounds pretty well, but it soon goes, if one
has a lot to do. Mr. Wood doesn't think it likely you could command a
vessel for twenty years at least. That only leaves thirty-four for
scientific research, and all the arranging at home besides. I've given
up one of my books to plotting this out in the rough, and I see that
there's plenty of English work for twenty years, even if I could count
on all my time, which (that's the worst of having a bad back and head!)
I can't. There's one thing I should like to find out, if ever you think
of going to Japan, and that's how they dwarf big plants like white
lilacs, and get them to flower in tiny pots. Isaac says he thinks it
must be continual shifting that does it--shifting and forcing. But I
fancy they must have some dodge of taking very small cuttings from
particular growths of the wood. I mean to try some experiments. I am
marking your journeys on a map, and where anything happens to you I put
A, for adventure, in red ink. I have put A where you picked up Dennis
O'Moore. He must be very nice. Tell him I hope I shall see him some day,
and your Scotch friend too; I hope they won't make you quite forget your
poor friend Charlie.

"P.S.--Since I finished, a parcel came. What do you think Lorraine has
done? He has paid for me to be a life member of a great London library,
and sent me the catalogue. I can have out fifteen books at a time. There
are hundreds of volumes. I can't write any more, my back aches so with
putting crosses against the books I want to read. The catalogue is
rather heavy. I think I shall use one of my books to make a list in of
what I want to read during this year. Isn't it good of Lorraine? Poor
Lorraine!"

Having devoured my own letters, I looked up to see how my comrades were
enjoying their share of the budget which the Halifax postmaster had
faithfully forwarded.

The expression on Dennis O'Moore'